Repeal and Replace Obamacare?

[Haggis@wk]

As I understand it, it'll keep you square with the law, but could put you in a bind if they come asking for the income source. My understanding is that doesn't happen often. The 1099 requirement is his, not yours, to comply with. Your responsibility is to report your income.

Your accountant can better advise you. From my point of view, it would be little different than taking a bunch of small jobs, for which cash payment would not be unexpected.

Actually as a small businessman myself "JHSecurity LLC" everytime I spend over $600 on any business related expenditure (travel, equipment, etc) I have to submit a 1099 in that quarter. If I buy a $600 laptop this month I have to submit a 1099 by April.

I was appalled when shopping to buy gold ring to replace my worn out 1912 $2.5 gold piece ring to learn that if the price of the ring exceeds $600 (it didn't) under the new law the store has to report all purchases of gold coins that exceed $600.

[jamiebk]

As I understand it, it'll keep you square with the law, but could put you in a bind if they come asking for the income source. My understanding is that doesn't happen often. The 1099 requirement is his, not yours, to comply with. Your responsibility is to report your income.

Your accountant can better advise you. From my point of view, it would be little different than taking a bunch of small jobs, for which cash payment would not be unexpected.

Actually as a small businessman myself "JHSecurity LLC" everytime I spend over $600 on any business related expenditure (travel, equipment, etc) I have to submit a 1099 in that quarter. If I buy a $600 laptop this month I have to submit a 1099 by April.

I was appalled when shopping to buy gold ring to replace my worn out 1912 $2.5 gold piece ring to learn that if the price of the ring exceeds $600 (it didn't) under the new law the store has to report all purchases of gold coins that exceed $600.

You can thank the Patriot act for such things...all in the name of tracking money to the bad guys.

[Haggis@wk]

You can thank the Patriot act for such things...all in the name of tracking money to the bad guys.

I don't know about that but both the 1099 change and the sale of gold change are both law implemented by ObamaCare.


ObamaCare waivers jump from 222 to 729.

the day after the President’s State of the Union, the new waivers are up. You may recall that there were 222 such waivers approved in November. That number has now jumped to 729 through the end of Dec

[Haggis@wk]

Private-sector healthcare reform: MinuteClinic Goes Viral, It Plans to Double the Number of Its Retail Clinics Over the Next 5 Years.

I’ve mentioned that my former doctor has, with several of his fellow doctors, started a “cash only” clinic. They accept no insurance including Medicare, Medicaid, etc. although they now will work out a payment plan. I’m not sure, but I assume they accept credit cards. Unlike the usual "doc-in-a-box" store front office they have a nice standalone building with all of the equipment whistle and bells you see in the better private clinics. I don't use him (yet!) but when I pass it seems to be well attended if the parking lot is any indication.

My current doctor apparently considered going private but has changed his mind and is building a larger practice.

[Haggis@wk]

GOP: Defeat of Health Law Repeal Is Step Toward Victory in 2012

Money quote?

Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., called the Republican repeal effort "one more hollow, symbolic, pander-to-the-masses amendment."

got that? Our Congress is responding to the overwhelming majority of Americans who want this bill repealed and that’s just “pandering to the masses”

What arrogance

[Shapley]

Methinks the bill was just 'pandering to the minority', so what's the beef?

[Haggis@wk]

Are ObamaCare Waivers Unconstitutional?

“The president cannot simply decide who does and does not have to follow the law.”

We are living in a thugocracy where the President picks his friends and rewards them accordingly. taxes and rules and laws are for the little people. How did we come to this state of affairs?

[piqaboo]

The waivers are nauseating.
The congressional 'this doesnt apply to us' is the most egregious of them.

[Haggis@wk]

CBO: Yes, ObamaCare is a job killer

To the tune of 800,000 jobs. That’s the word of Doug Elmendorf, head of the Congressional Budget Office, in testimony before Congress today.

Campbell: You just mentioned that you believe—or that in your estimate, that the health-care law would reduce the labor used in the economy by about one half of one percent. Given that, I believe you say, there’s 160 million full-time people working in 2021, that means that, in your estimation, the health-care law would reduce employment by 800,000 in 2021. Is that correct?

Elmendorf: Yes. The way I would put it is that we do estimate, as you said, that household employment will be about 160 million by the end of the decade. Half a percent of that is 800,000.

Never mind “If you like your coverage, you can keep your coverage.” ObamaCare, threaten our very livelihoods

[Shapley]

That's just all those artists and musicians that can now quit their jobs and focus on their talents because Nancy Pelosi's got their back...

[Haggis@wk]

Your thoughts belong to the government

That’s the ruling by federal Judge Gladys Kessler in upholding the Obamacare mandate. (pg. 45, emphasis mine):

As previous Commerce Clause cases have all involved physical activity, as opposed to mental activity, i.e. decision-making, there is little judicial guidance on whether the latter falls within Congress’s power....However, this Court finds the distinction, which Plaintiffs rely on heavily, to be of little significance. It is pure semantics to argue that an individual who makes a choice to forgo health insurance is not “acting,” especially given the serious economic and health-related consequences to every individual of that choice. Making a choice is an affirmative action, whether one decides to do something or not do something. They are two sides of the same coin. To pretend otherwise is to ignore reality.

Our thoughts are now actions. There literally is nothing the federal government cannot regulate provided there is even a hypothetical connection to the economy, even if the connection at most is in the future.

Our thoughts are now actions. Oh, I said that already. I just can't get over it.

The following sentence has now become a justification for regulating decision-making even where the decision is just to do nothing:

The Congress shall have power.... To regulate commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes;

Under this ruling you have no real choice regardless of what you decide, so sayeth the court.

If I decide not to buy a car, I’m acting, and if the government wanted to require me to buy a car, under this ruling, it could.

Good lord.

That’s just absurd (but Government Motors will most likely be putting together a heck of a lobbying effort to carry this ruling out to its logical end).

I think I'm going to be ill. Which of course, is now subject to regulations to be promulgated by the Secretary of Health and Human Services.

[dai bread]

"I think I'm going to be ill. Which of course, is now subject to regulations to be promulgated by the Secretary of Health and Human Services".

[Haggis@wk]

ObamaCare continues to unravel, both in the courtroom and in its rollout. The Department of Health and Human Services added another 126 waivers on Friday for health plans that don’t meet the new federal requirements, bringing the total number of waivers to over 1,000:

HHS posted 126 new waivers on Friday, bringing the total to 1,040 organizations that have been granted a one-year exemption from a new coverage requirement included in the healthcare reform law enacted almost a year ago. Waivers have become a hot-button issue for Republicans, eager to expose any vulnerabilities in the reform law.

In order to avoid disruption in the insurance market, the healthcare overhaul gives HHS the power to grant waivers to firms that cannot meet new annual coverage limits in 2011. The waivers have typically been granted to so-called “mini-med” plans that offer limited annual coverage — as low as $2,000 — that would fall short of meeting the new annual coverage floor of $750,000 in 2011.

“We don’t want to take away people’s health insurance before they have some realistic other choices,” HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in an interview with The Hill earlier this year.

After 2014 taxpayers will pick up most of the tab instead of the employers and employees that get waivers now.

Curiously, no one at HHS has explained how these organizations get waivers. There appears to be no set standard for them. Rep. Fred Upton, the chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, demanded such an explanation seven weeks ago. None has been forthcoming, but HHS has managed to add over 800 waivers in those seven weeks.

[piqaboo]

You're acting. The act is a negative one - not buying whatever- but its an action that is measured.
Its comparable to having a kid in the car without a carseat.
I can decide someone is a stupid poopyface, but until I act by calling them that, no one knows what I thought or decided.

[Haggis@wk]

If you had any doubt that Obamacare was a huge scam, let Jamie Dupree blast it away like an oyster cracker before a sandstorm.

Facing questions from both parties in the Congress, the Obama Administration has now revealed how it has spent over $1.7 billion on part of the Obama health law, known as the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program.

This plan is intended to help companies pay the cost of health care for their early retirees, but lawmakers say it is wrongly benefiting companies like AT&T and General Electric, who have billions in profits on their bottom lines.

The list that follows is like a Who’s Who of big campaign donors, unions, and public employee groups. Six of the top ten recipients are pension systems for public employees. The United Auto Workers, already $3.4 richer from the auto bailout, topped the list with an award of almost $207 million. General Electric, which paid no taxes at all in 2010 and whose CEO is a darling of the White House, received $36.6 million, good for 11th place on the list.

AT&T, which placed second on the list, spent slightly under $15.4 million on lobbying efforts in 2010 and will rake in over $140 million from just this portion of Obamacare. Verizon, third on the list, will make $91.9 million on its $16.75 million 2010 lobbying investment.

This has to stop.

[jamiebk]

If you had any doubt that Obamacare was a huge scam, let Jamie Dupree blast it away like an oyster cracker before a sandstorm.

Facing questions from both parties in the Congress, the Obama Administration has now revealed how it has spent over $1.7 billion on part of the Obama health law, known as the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program.

This plan is intended to help companies pay the cost of health care for their early retirees, but lawmakers say it is wrongly benefiting companies like AT&T and General Electric, who have billions in profits on their bottom lines.

The list that follows is like a Who’s Who of big campaign donors, unions, and public employee groups. Six of the top ten recipients are pension systems for public employees. The United Auto Workers, already $3.4 richer from the auto bailout, topped the list with an award of almost $207 million. General Electric, which paid no taxes at all in 2010 and whose CEO is a darling of the White House, received $36.6 million, good for 11th place on the list.

AT&T, which placed second on the list, spent slightly under $15.4 million on lobbying efforts in 2010 and will rake in over $140 million from just this portion of Obamacare. Verizon, third on the list, will make $91.9 million on its $16.75 million 2010 lobbying investment.

This has to stop.

For sure. We have to get the Republicans back in office....They'd never do anything like that! The only difference is that it would go to their friends instead of Obama's.

[Shapley]

As I understand it, the intent was to subsidize companies in order to have them offer continued insurance coverage to retirees who leave the company through retirement while stilll too young to qualify for Medicare - thus either being uninsured or needing to purchase their own coverage.

In essense, therefore, the government has lowered Medicare premiums through a sort of backdoor, or else agreed to pay purchase insurance for a select group, using their past employers as a proxy in order to get better rates. Either way, it is a crappy deal for the taxpayers, we subsidize insurance for retirees who retire too young to qualify through normal channels.

I also have to wonder - are the companies billing the government for their group-policy rates, or are they charging the premium rates?

[Haggis@wk]

For sure. We have to get the Republicans back in office....They'd never do anything like that! The only difference is that it would go to their friends instead of Obama's.

Well, based on the recent past you'd be forgiven for your cynicism. However don't forget that the Republican have already repealed the entire mess. there are many things that can be done to improve our health cre but Obamacare ain't it. This vile law was never about health care, it was all about power over you and me, and driving our country to the brink of insolvency was a minor consideration in their rush to achieve that power forever.

[Giant Communist Robot]

This vile law was never about health care

Of course it was. They had a dream, that for pennies a day we could all enjoy the best health care possible. I'm not being sarcastic, I mean that. The devil is in the details. My nine year old dreams of time travel; the detail is the time machine.

there are many things that can be done to improve our health

I see two problems immediately with health care in the U.S. : since it is not a free market it has become subject to regulatory capture, and since individuals have no vested interest in keeping charges down there may actually be an incentive for them to raise the bill.

[Haggis@wk]

Of course it was. They had a dream, that for pennies a day we could all enjoy the best health care possible. I'm not being sarcastic, I mean that. The devil is in the details. My nine year old dreams of time travel; the detail is the time machine.

Then you and I will never agree on this point. If it was all about the "uninsured" then a third of the proposed health care bill would have provided more than a million dollars to every uninsured American. It was always about someone else deciding what's "best" for each and every Americans.....absent Congress, the president and most of the U.S. government employees who were exempted from the same law that's designed to shackle you and I

there are many things that can be done to improve our health

Open every state's insurance market to a competitive process would have been/is a major restructuring to our current health care laws.

I see two problems immediately with health care in the U.S. : since it is not a free market it has become subject to regulatory capture, and since individuals have no vested interest in keeping charges down there may actually be an incentive for them to raise the bill.

Which means rationing and "death panels," similar to those we currently see in England and the expenses are STILL killing the NHS. I will never understand people who feel the government is the best arbiter of my health care.